


not in kansas anymore

by dhils



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Future Fic, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, the freddie andersen trade?? yeah that never happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-10
Updated: 2019-06-10
Packaged: 2020-04-23 20:10:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19158118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dhils/pseuds/dhils
Summary: “I’m sorry,” Freddie says, and the screen door slides shut.“You don’t have to be.”Freddie’s hand touches Connor’s shoulder and he’ll say, “but I want to be,” or, “just come inside,” or, “I am.”But instead, he says, “and you don’t have to be here, but you are.”





	not in kansas anymore

**Author's Note:**

  * For [doespenguinsisgay](https://archiveofourown.org/users/doespenguinsisgay/gifts).



> happy birthday babey!!! 
> 
> this fic is entirely dedicated to the loml and i WISH i could hand my heart over with it bc hey uh? i love this superstar w everything in me? rachel, u rly are amazing n wonderful and deserve the absolute Most. 
> 
> to my favourite ~~leafs~~ pens fan, here r ur two favourite carrot boys!🥕💓

Connor never called. Before impulsively hopping that plane, before taking out a rental, before driving down to Freddie’s modest little condo tucked away in his own quiet corner of Anaheim. Connor had enough time to warn him he’d be coming, enough time that he went through an entire seven hour flight with his thoughts hovering around whether this is even a good idea. Whether it’s right to do this, just to show up like he’s a kid kicked out of his parent’s place.

It feels, rather, that he’s being kicked out of his own city. But Connor left of his own accord, which is. A shitty feeling. He left with his head ducked and his shoulders slumped, a hat pulled low over his eyes as he navigated that same airport he’s been in time and time again. Just. This time it was while exhaustion cracked over his chest like a whip, not something from sleepless nights, but instead from the grief of making it so far, to the damn Stanley Cup Finals, only to be labelled a runner-up.

In Anaheim, he spends longer taking wrong turns than he’d have to if he just called Freddie to pick him up from the airport. Or if he called a cab, if he just let himself ask for help like that. But he sticks to the maps app on his phone and tells himself that everytime a minute gets tacked onto his arrival time, he’s not stalling. 

Still, even as he pulls up to Freddie’s house—which is still unmistakably familiar from the outside—his fingers waver over the car keys before he lets himself actually get out. 

Turning them back goes smoother than he would’ve hoped, a small voice in the back of his head still echoing for him to call a hotel or back off. That he shouldn’t even be here. That he’s bothering him and after a first round exit, there’s no way Freddie’s still in Anaheim.

But. His feet carry him all the way to the door with only the slightest hesitance buzzing underneath his skin and his hand knocks against it in some quick pattern, before he really does consider pulling a u-turn just to hide away in a hotel.

He’s embarrassed about just how much he worries while standing there. His face feels hot and so does the back of his neck, from the way the sun isn’t doing him any favours. Still burning bright. Because Connor may be wavering on the edge of caught in the worst situation he could put himself in, but the world is still turning. It’s a reality check, almost.

Until Freddie’s looking back at him, something incoherent frantically washing over his face. Connor can’t go into detail about it, he doesn’t think he could even if he wanted to, it’s on and off like that. Something he can’t read. 

Freddie says, “hi,” a little wry, and he looks like he wants to add something to that. “You’re kind of far from home?” 

His tone is light, not quite what Connor was imagining. It isn’t stern like he thought it’d be. It isn’t telling Connor to get the hell away from him or snapping something before slamming the door shut hard enough that Connor can feel his own bones rattle. 

Although Connor hasn’t exactly said anything yet. 

“We lost,” he manages, feeling it so clearly juxtaposed against all the other conversations they’ve had here. When Connor wasn’t broken and crawling to Anaheim as a last resort, because his own city is full of prying eyes and whispered words that make his entire being feel like it’s under fire. 

Freddie looks at him with something too similar to sympathy for it to be anything else, but it’s just barely a ghost of it. It’s in the way his brows knit into in a frown, the way his eyes swirl with warmth, but his lips are still a thin line of confusion. 

“I know,” he says, like he’s picking his words as carefully as he can. “I listened to the game. That was. That wasn’t too long ago. Connor, why are you here?”

Connor swallows a slow breath, as if he just focuses on breathing he won’t have to say a word to explain himself. “I can’t be back there,” he says. Every part of him knows it isn’t enough, but. “There’s nothing _for_ me in Toronto.” 

Freddie looks at him, his gaze shifting to critical. He knows Connor’s parents are still in Toronto, that it’s where his team is, where he was born and raised, where he tied his first pair of skates and last took them off. So, he knows that all Connor has is in Toronto. 

“And there’s something for you in Anaheim?“ Freddie’s hands are still on the door and it’s what sets Connor’s teeth on edge. It’s what has him waiting for it to swing shut. 

It never does, and Connor can tell him, “no,” with all the confidence that he bought that plane ticket with. One-way and miles away from home. Where he shouldn’t have ever gone in the first place. “I just wanted to be anywhere else and this is, I guess, anywhere else.”

“Did you book a room?” Freddie asks, and Connor stares down at his hands. At the ground where he’s hoped, at least twice now, that a hole would open up and pull him away. 

“I didn’t, actually. I thought I’d come see you first.” When he lifts his eyes, Freddie’s face is still blank. Neutral. It’s a look he’s seen on him enough times to be convinced it’s stuck like glue. “Do you think I could spend the night? Or—or stay with you?”

“I think,” Freddie starts, pausing. He doesn’t hold the door open any wider. “I think you should come in first.”

 

 

(Game 7 of the damn Stanley Cup Final is nothing if it isn’t a mess. It‘s sharp words between rivals, checks that have players wilting against the boards, and a game that goes straight to OT just to top off a third period that feels useless. 

Connor’s on the bench breathing hard, his lungs catching in his throat. Each intake of air is labour when he’s watching a game with stakes this high unfurl from the sidelines. Warmth spreads all through his fingertips, itching to do this. They _have_ to do this. There isn’t any other option.

History is told by the winners and Connor wants to write history. 

But. It’s one thing to watch the overtime period from the bench and another to be on the ice with his chest heaving and his head working and his entire world condensed into one moment. 

There’s a difference between losing on the bench and on the ice. 

When he’s on the ice and the puck crashes into the wrong net, his legs feel like they’re going to give out underneath him. When he’s on the ice, he gets a perfect view of the wrong team flooding off the bench, guys in uniforms that aren’t his own crowding around their goalie, cheering and drenched with sweat and tears and joy. 

When he’s on the ice, he feels lost.)

 

 

Connor cups his mug with gentle hands, feeling the coffee soak his fingers with an awfully familiar heat through the ceramic. It’s a nice feeling, like a hug or getting his hands held. 

It’s a lot harder to think of either of those things while Freddie’s sitting by him with his own mug, still turning things over in his head, but Connor’s determined to give him time. Because Freddie’s one of the most patient people he knows, Frederik Andersen has never been waved off for his patience. 

“We all lose, it’s just another game,” he says, after a moment. After Connor explained how just thinking of getting on the ice again makes his heart jitter and his gut twist with fear. 

“We lost the wrong game.”

Nobody talks about the losers, history is not theirs. It has never been theirs. And Connor finally understands, because why would anybody want to hear from the boys with shattered dreams and heavy hearts. 

“Losing once doesn’t mean you’re never making it back. You’re still—you have so much ahead of you,” Freddie continues, but his eyes are watchful. Like he’s gauging whether or not Connor wants to hear any of this. 

Connor has heard it already. Heard it from his mother, who he’d called immediately after game seven, heard it from Patrick Marleau, who’s hanging his skates up for good, heard it from Babs, too. He’s heard it from every perspective, every way of wording it, but somehow, when Freddie says it, all he feels is frustration hissing in his veins. 

He takes a sip of his coffee, enough all at once that it burns going down. “You can’t tell me that. You _know_ you can’t tell me that.”

“I don’t know what you want me to say then. It was one bad series. Do you know how many more you’re going to play?” Freddie‘s still watching him like he’s going to break at any second, like he’s waiting for it. “Some guys, really talented guys, play for decades and never even make it past, what, the second round? You need to breathe, Connor.” 

Connor is still focusing on his breaths. In through his nose, out through his mouth. Freddie has no idea how long he _has_ been breathing. Trying to.

“Ovechkin didn’t win a cup until he turned thirty-two,” Freddie says.

Connor can’t help the way, “Before that, Ovechkin didn’t even come close,” falls from his lips.

Freddie opens his mouth to say something, but even as it looks like he’s going to argue, nothing comes out. His eyes track over the room to the windows at the other end, where warm orange light is filtering in through the curtains. 

Connor says, “we got our chance. We made it. And then I blew it.” 

He doesn’t want to talk about this anymore, but he has to mention the way it was worse on the ice. The way every moment he’d yearned for a victory on home ice came crashing down. The way nine years of trying for this went to waste. He doesn’t. Maybe it’s because he hates the way Freddie’s expression turns to pity. 

“It’s just hockey,” Freddie says, and the couch dips as he shifts closer, hesitant. “Not the rest of your life. Don’t let it turn into that.” 

Connor brings his mug down to his lap and stares at the coffee. The way its made him feel warm is still there, but it’s dulled. The same way his energy dulls, like the lead of pencil that’s been scrubbed ruthlessly against a sheet of paper. 

He’s quiet for a beat. “I know,” he says, because he does. Because he’s heard it. Will hear it more, if he doesn’t close off. 

He looks at Freddie’s mug, his legs, his arms, listens to the way Freddie breaths and not once does Connor want to touch. 

“I’m gonna go get the guest room made up, yeah?” He says, gentle, like Connor is a child that needs to be spoken to with hushed volumes and delicate words. 

Connor watches him go. 

 

 

He’s got a toothbrush in his bag, but there’s still one in its packaging when Connor lets himself into the bathroom. It’s on the white marble countertop, where everything is clean and perfect and not a thing is out of place. 

Except. Connor looks in the mirror and, not for a moment, does he feel like he belongs here. Staring back at him in the reflection are neat shower curtains, white walls, and soft edges to every corner of the room. But Connor looks out of place. He looks tired, more like he hasn’t gotten enough sleep this time. His skin is drained of all its colour, shadowy underneath the lights, and he looks like he’s miserable. 

He shouldn’t even be here. Connor isn’t Anaheim, it isn’t anything like Toronto. But he still finds himself running a shower. He still finds himself tidying up for bed and ending up buried beneath sheets that feel blessedly soft. Compared to the airplane seat he’d spent the worst part of his day in. 

His phone is dead at the bottom of his bag, so he doesn’t set an alarm, but he doesn’t pull it out to plug it into the wall either. Just because another day of quiet seems a lot more tempting than having to scroll through piles of texts. Because this feels a lot more deserving of his attention.

His mind doesn’t suddenly go quiet, not when he’s in a completely new environment with the weight of every mistake he’s ever made sitting on his chest, but he counts his breaths. Counts up and up and up until something clicks. 

 

 

(In a year, the Leafs matchup against Anaheim twice. 

Twice, and Connor’s itching to tie just to avoid a series sweep. They’ve played once before in the season, he can barely think about it without frustration burrowing deep in his chest, and he’s ready to go.

He’s barely twenty-five and the excitement to play on NHL ice is still fresh on him, coming off in waves. But the enthusiasm to score, that’s even more of a rush. Something pushing and pushing and—

He’s got a hand pressing into the divider, feeling anticipation down to his skates, and he’s spurring with the need to throw himself over and hit the ice. His toes curling and his eyes locked onto the play.

There’s a shot, two, in their own zone, and each time Connor feels himself gritting his teeth, wincing. It’s hard to watch, it’s always hard to watch. Especially when he’s seconds from a line change and he’s waiting for a switch of possession just so he can get out there. So he can do this. He _can_ do this.

Someone calls a line change and Connor gets over timed just well enough that it doesn’t catch any eyes and it’s theirs. 

Their puck as they skate past the blue lines, as they set something up, as Connor’s brain is fixating on ways to expose holes in the defence, passing around the house over and over and.

There’s an opening. The puck is rolling when it gets to him, but there’s an opening and Connor takes the one-timer with all the force he can pack into a shot.

He’s on his knee when the puck slides off his stick. Andersen’s cage makes a dangerous sound. Something like clanging as the puck careens away from his net. Which is the first thing that Connor registers, but right after that it’s the way Andersen folds in on himself. The way he looks small against the ice, his hand frantically shaking his blocker off.

It’s all a rush. A trainer comes out onto the ice, his guys in orange surround him, and Connor can feels his mouth go dry. 

Andersen is cleared to play the rest of the game. It takes a minute, and the crowd ripples with cheers as he gets back to his feet, but he’s cleared. He’s okay.

Zach tells Connor, “you gotta chill, he’s fine,” with a frown and a sturdy pat to chest. Like he’s literally knocking the sense back into Connor. 

He really is okay.

It isn’t released until a few days later that Andersen’s showing signs of a concussion. And Connor feels his stomach sink to his feet.)

 

 

Connor pads down the hall in the morning with a clear head and every ache in his body somehow accentuated by the night’s sleep. His muscles feel pulled taut, the pain fizzing from his legs to his shoulders, and it was difficult on its own to remove himself from the warmth of soft, soft bed sheets. This in itself is a mountain. 

Things like pictures and team memorabilia line Freddie’s hallway, a bit of a contrast from the Ikea aesthetic hovering over everything you can see from the foyer. The kitchen, the living room. But this hallway is private, with a framed jersey up on the wall and snapshots of on-ice moments littered all across the place. 

The little smile that plays over his lips is bittersweet and it doesn’t last much longer than a second or so, before he lets his eyes drop and makes it out to the kitchen. There are a lot of things in Freddie’s house that Connor’s always avoided, and seeing whispers of victories scattered along the hall fills him with something painful.

It’s a twisted feeling of envy, something that bubbles up alongside a pride that he doesn’t think he would ever admit to anyone but himself.

He doesn’t think he can even admit it to himself. 

Freddie’s in the kitchen when he makes it in, and he’s reading something that looks like some god awful interior decorating magazine. His eyes are focused, cutting sharp across the pages when he flips it. The orange next to him is only half peeled, the rind laying pathetically beneath the portion that is yet untouched. 

Connor feels awkward standing there and watching him. He feels awkward because a small part of him sees this and recognizes it from earlier mornings. A terrible part of him revels in that sense of familiarity. The pot of coffee on the counter, the basket of fruit in the center of the table, the—floor that creaks underneath Connor’s next step.

Freddie’s head jerks up to look at him like he wasn’t expecting Connor to be here in the morning. It makes him feel even more out of place. It’s what lingers after Freddie’s expression softens and his focus loosens. A glance down at the magazine here, a nod towards the coffee pot there.

“You can help yourself,” he says, and offers a smile that comes off like it’s supposed to make Connor feel more comfortable. Freddie’s lips are still pressed into a flat line, and Connor swears he could suffocate with how much he hates that look. 

“Thanks,” he mumbles instead, and helps himself to a mug, one of the ones at the front of the cupboard. He doesn’t want to have to go through too much to look for things. Part of him actually wishes he didn’t know where anything was, wishes this was new territory, but. 

“Sleep well?” Freddie asks. 

He keeps his eyes on pouring the coffee, but just a fraction of his gaze won’t stop wavering on Freddie. “Yeah, actually, thanks.” 

Freddie hums in return. “That’s great. Really great. I’m glad,” he says, and there’s something in the tone of his voice that makes Connor worry.

“Yeah,” he says.

And, “how many people know?” Freddie asks him, voice carefully controlled. 

Connor curls a hand into the edge of the counter. It’s supposed to be reaching for the mug, but he isn’t going to trust himself with holding it. “Know what?”

There’s a quiet drag of the chair against the floor and when Connor looks back at him, he’s still sitting, but there’s this energy crackling between them. Something like electricity. 

Connor doesn’t feel small until Freddie stands. 

“Hyms,” he says, eventually. “I told Zach I was leaving.” 

Freddie still doesn’t look content, as if that wasn’t enough of an answer. “To where? Where did you tell him you were going?” 

Connor’s gaze bounces over Freddie’s expression. It’s all so painstakingly structured that he couldn’t pick it apart if he tried.

“Away.”

“That’s it?” Freddie twists his mouth into a frown. That’s a closest he gets to something readable. “Have you called him?” 

“Last night,” Connor lies through his teeth, and Freddie inhales a breath. 

“Okay,” he says, plucking his orange off the table. “Okay. I just needed to know. I don’t want you to isolate yourself because of this, that isn’t going to solve anything.”

“I’m telling you I called him.” Connor’s just short of snapping. He hates it. “He _knows_. You can stop acting like you’re my babysitter. It’s—it’s none of your business.” 

“It kind of should be my business, you know. Because you’re halfway across the continent and the only person that knows you’re here is Zach.” 

“Zach’s the only one I trust,” Connor says, urgent, because lying is getting harder by the second. It’s this weight that builds and builds and it’s going to snap. 

“So he’s going to lie for you? To anyone who asks?” Freddie looks at him with these narrow eyes, wrapped up in something condescending. “Do your parents know?” 

“It doesn’t matter who knows because it’s not your business,” Connor repeats, and he wants to raise his voice and yell, but. This isn’t going to turn into that, he can’t let that happen. “This is my problem. I just. I need you to be here.” 

Freddie looks at him like he’s in disbelief. And of what, Connor doesn’t know, but he thinks he might not want to. 

Freddie leaves the kitchen in silence, and Connor’s left feeling awful, stupid, and so fucking selfish. It’s all in his chest, hurting when he breathes like it’s bruising his lungs. 

 

 

(Zach’s on him the second that horn sounds, the wrong team, the wrong game, the wrong time. Everything is wrong, but the way Zach’s skating slows to a glide as he pulls Connor into an embrace feels okay. 

Connor sees the way his arms stretch into a hug before he feels them, and when he feels it all he can do is hold onto him and shake off his dirty fucking mitts. Stanley Cup losing gloves. 

His fingers curl into the back of Zach’s jersey and he makes a point of refusing to let go.

“It’s okay,” Zach says. “It’s okay. It’s okay, you need to know that. Connor, say it’s okay. Say you know.” 

Connor’s hold on him tightens. Everything is out of place. Everything is wrong. He lost what was clenched in his palm tight enough to leave marks and now he doesn’t know what to do with himself.

“It’s okay,” Connor echos, into his jersey. He isn’t sure if he believes it, but it’s worth it for the way Zach seems to relax.

The cheers are too loud to block out. Connor buries himself because it’s the only way to try and fight this. 

“I love you, alright? No matter what happens, what hell we’re gonna go through next, I love you,” Zach says. 

Connor could cry. Zach doesn’t owe him anything. Zach has never owed Connor a _thing_ , but he’s the best friend anyone could ever ask for.

“I love you, too,” Connor chokes out.

Zach pats his back. “I know, buddy. I know.”)

 

 

Freddie’s place isn’t something that he wants to be familiar with. None of what happens is something Connor wants to know. He doesn’t want a thing to do with the way Freddie’s always gone late in the evening on a run, or how he disappears around noon to break for the gym, or how his cheeks are always flushed pink and his hair is damp against his forehead when he’s back. 

He wishes he didn’t know about the little ticks Freddie has. How he can’t leave dirty dishes lying around the place, or how he needs his kitchen spotless because it’s where he works, or how he will rearrange things when he’s nervous. 

Freddie is far from unique. He isn’t something special, he shouldn’t _be_ something special, but Connor always finds thoughts that shouldn’t be there crossing his mind. Thoughts that make his heart flutter and his eyes drop to his hands whenever they’re around each other. 

Connor always thought—thought there was something between them, but Freddie treats him like a house guest and it’s. It’s the same old thing.

 

 

Connor picks at the skin on his thumb. It’s smarting something with little flickers of pain, where it’s raw and pink, and it’s a nervous habit he shouldn’t do. Something he should’ve given up forever ago, but it’s been hard to think straight lately. 

Freddie sighs, patient. Connor’s watching him.

“Zach called,” he repeats, still just as gentle. 

Connor knew it was just a matter of time.

His phone is still dead. Still hidden somewhere in his bag. He knows better than to leave it dead for this long, if he wants to get it back on at least, but it’s too late to worry about that. 

“Do you want me to tell you what he said, or do you already know?” 

Connor stares at the TV. There’s a game on, nothing special. It’s just baseball. Quietly, he wishes he felt the same way about hockey. 

“What did you say to him?” Connor asks. It’s hard to move his lips around the words, his tongue feeling too big in his mouth. It might be the anxiety welling up in his chest, but he knows nothing would come out in the first place if it was just that. 

“What did you say,” Connor tries again. His voice sounds pathetic when it falls against his own ears. Quiet. Worn. 

“You’re asking me whether or not I lied for you.” 

“That’s not. No.” He can feel the nerves spread through him, intense and overwhelming. Everything he wants to say leaves a bitter taste in his mouth and Connor can’t. Think. “You know what I’m asking you. Does he know? What did you say?” 

The way Freddie looks at him is not unkind, but it makes Connor feel awful anyways. 

He’s selfish, selfish, selfish, and it’s never felt worse. At least he knows. 

“I lied to him,” Freddie says. “I barely _know_ the guy and I lied to him for you. Do you have any idea how fucked up that is?” 

“You know _me_ ,” Connor argues, but there’s a wobble in his voice that doesn’t help it sound anywhere near genuine. “Freddie, you know I can’t just. I can’t face him.” 

“Not if you’re in Anaheim. You shouldn’t even be here, that’s what this means.” Freddie’s shoulders slump, his attention zeroing in on the TV where someone is rapidly listing off player statistics. He doesn’t look at all concerned. “You can’t avoid anyone forever. You have training camp, we both do, and then—then you have a whole other season.”

“Not right now.” Which is true. But Connor knows, he’s mature enough to admit, that it isn’t going to be enough. “I can’t think about this right now. I just. I want.” His lips are one step in the wrong direction from betraying him, asking for the wrong thing. Because it’s so easy just to look at Freddie and think—please. “I just want to get away from everything.”

Freddie’s sudden interest in the TV breaks when he turns to look at him. There’s remorse in his expression, drawn up clean and visible. “I want you to call him. Text him. Do something, Connor, you’re acting like a kid. He needs to know before someone puts out a damn missing persons report.” 

Connor feels his gut twist with something poisonous, something close enough to frustration that he thinks he could get up and storm away now. Or sink into the couch. Or _plead_ , but he just breathes into his hands. In and out. “Tomorrow. I can. Tomorrow morning, my phone is dead.” 

Freddie’s gaze is skeptical, but he nods. “Tomorrow morning.”

They’re close enough on the couch that their knees could touch, maybe. If Connor didn’t shift away, folding his legs underneath himself. He could touch. Sometimes, it’s destructive, how bad his fingers itch to reach out, but he can never do it. Always cutting himself just short of letting his chest swell with a want like that, and he can just press it all down.

 

 

(The first time Freddie kisses Connor, it’s in a too dark, too risky corner of the Honda Center. It’s when Connor’s miles away from home, when he can still taste the ice on his tongue and feels adrenaline buzzing underneath his skin. It’s hockey, and greasy goals, and Freddie back on the ice after being gone for as long as Connor had taken him out for. 

Then it’s his fingers tight on Freddie’s coat, on his tie, breathing him in like he’s his last breath of oxygen. It’s intoxicating, lifting him higher and higher and when Freddie’s teeth skim his bottom lip it’s this unexpected jolt of warmth that keeps him in close. 

“I’m still sorry,” Connor pants out, into the space between their lips, before Freddie pulls him back in again. “About the headshot—the shot.” 

It’s been long enough that it shouldn’t matter anymore, but Connor can still feel the guilt of that pressing down on him.

He’s speaking between kisses, and so is Freddie, when he laughs and says, “keep talking.” 

It’s quick and dirty and poor decision making, but Connor’s never wanted anything more.)

 

 

Connor knows he isn’t a good person for flirting with the edge of giving up when his phone powers on. He knows it can’t happen, that the second he sees the piles upon piles of missed calls and texts waiting on his lock screen he wishes he never let Freddie talk him into it. 

But he knows this is just another puzzle piece destined to slot into Connor’s life and the jagged edges make it a harder slide, but this is where it belongs. 

He swipes through texts, scanning them while his phone is still plugged into the wall. 

He’s sitting cross legged on the floor and he feels like a kid, his back pressed to the wall. His eyes skim over each message, looking for key names. There’s a text from Auston, one from his mother, and a few from Mitch. 

But the first one he goes to is Zach’s, whose last text ended in _call me please_. Connor doesn’t call. Connor won’t call, because he can send out one text and back away all over again. 

He tells Zach where he is. He tells Zach that he is safe and content and that he just needs space. He tells Zach that Freddie’s the one who talked him into texting, and tells him not to call because he won’t pick up. But also tells him that he misses him.

It’s a paragraph full of mismatched emotions and Connor’s morning brain working double time, all while he’s still trying to blink the sleep out of his eyes. Still, he hits send while his courage lasts, and powers his phone off.

 

 

Zach texts back: _please stay safe_ and _thank you so much_ , and that’s that.

Connor stares at the ceiling and wishes he had the courage to go back. He stares at the walls of a room he shouldn’t even be in, stares out at a city that has never been his home, and wishes it didn’t feel like the safest place in the world to him. Right in this moment.

 

 

The living room is bathed in saturated pinks and oranges. It’s too early in the morning for him to be up. Out of the guest room with his head tilted against the back of the couch. 

He doesn’t watch much more than baseball nowadays, listening to the droning voice of somebody recapping last night’s games. There’s an occasional lilt somewhere there, when the voice covers a particularly spectacular homer or catch that had fans on their feet, but everything else blurs into something unrecognizable. 

He’s not thinking. About anything. 

The TV is quiet enough that each word sticks to his ears but doesn’t quite make it in, quiet enough that he hopes it isn’t a bother to Freddie, who is more likely than not asleep. 

Although, when the front door opens and Freddie steps in with a paper bag pressed to his chest and car keys jingling in his pocket, the first thing Connor thinks is, of course. He’s never once woken up before him. There’s no way that was about to change. 

Freddie looks startled almost, but that shifts into something a little more collected when he registers what exactly is happening. 

“Sorry, I,” Connor waves at the TV and then shrugs, not too confident in his ability to form an actual sentence. “Couldn’t sleep.” 

“It’s pretty early for you.” Freddie doesn’t set the paper bag down as he kicks his shoes off, but Connor thinks he can assume they’re groceries. “I was hoping for at least another hour of silence before you’d be up.” 

There’s a quirk in his lips, for the first time in a while, and Connor wishes his eyes didn’t linger on it. He wishes it wasn’t the only thing that grabbed his attention, but that’s exactly where he’s frozen. 

It’s not new, seeing Freddie’s small smile, but it’s unfamiliar. It’s pleasant and Connor feels stupid, working with a handful of sleep and staring at Freddie holding a damn bag of food like he’s never seen anything more beautiful. He watches him line his shoes up against the wall, watches his hands, the long length of his back, and. Connor thinks that might just be the case. 

“Did you go grocery shopping at nine in the morning?” 

Freddie huffs out a little laugh as he heads down to the kitchen. It’s a good mood, Connor realizes after a moment. He’s in a good mood. “Well, yeah. Early bird catches the worm, right? And you usually sleep until, what, two?”

“I was up at eleven yesterday,” Connor protests, only half guilty about shirking training. The ice isn’t going to treat him right the next time he hits it, but he thinks he can busy himself with this for now. That’s a bridge to cross, but not in the moment.

“Of course, what was I thinking,” is the last thing Freddie gets out before disappearing into the kitchen, and Connor is glad. About this and that. Because it means nobody sees the way he smiles down at his hand.

 

 

Between Anaheim and Toronto, Connor prefers the evenings outside in Toronto. He prefers the soft cool breeze that falls over the city, or the way the night is when everything chills. He likes feeling each breath he pulls in blow ice into his lungs, like frozen kisses. 

Anaheim doesn’t get that. It never does. Anaheim is humid and warm, even as the night bugs come out. Crickets chirping in the grass with Freddie’s backyard awash in pale moonlight. 

The air is sticky and latches onto his skin in a way that feels sickening. 

Most of the house lights are still on, because it’d be too dark otherwise. It drapes a yellowish tint overtop Freddie’s face, all down to where his forearms are pressed to the porch railing. And the light reflects off the bottle in his hands just as it does in his eyes. It looks like gold. 

Connor’s gotten so used to looking in private, that even as he feels Freddie’s gaze drop to him, his eyes linger. Too long and too low, on the way his arms are braced. It’s stupid. He shouldn’t be this caught up. 

“Why Anaheim,” Freddie asks him, startling the silence between both of them. “Why _here_ , I mean. It could’ve been anywhere else, you could’ve gone anywhere. But you came here.”

Connor doesn’t know how to answer that without completely embarrassing himself. Especially because his shoulder is inches from Freddie’s and all he can think about is the warmth coming off of him. How Connor has felt that warmth before, up close against him. How memories like that have faded into the past but they’re still fresh in his mind when he doesn’t want them. 

He never wants them. 

“Nobody would suspect it,” Connor tells him, avoiding every other explanation he could’ve gone with. The things he needs to swallow down, before the way Freddie looks at him coaxes it all out. “Nobody thinks Anaheim, nobody but Zach. But that’s only because Zach knows about…”

There’s a beat of something heavy between them and Connor decides not to finish that. Decides to stare down at the grass instead. The porch light doesn’t do much for it, instead turning it into this dimly lit sea of black. 

“Zach’s my person,” Connor adds, towards the lawn. “And if I came here, I’d actually get to run away. It wouldn’t be me hiding out in some hotel in Toronto. People—people don’t know where I am and it feels incredible.” 

“Oh,” Freddie says. It’s vague, and Connor thinks he could interpret it a thousand different ways, so he doesn’t try.

“Yeah, it’s. When we lost on home ice, I looked at that crowd and I thought. This is it. This is the end,” Connor says, and feels his throat tighten up. “Before we played in the final, I thought: no matter what happens, this is our game. This is our sport. And now.” 

Connor’s thumb picks at the label on his own bottle. It doesn’t go far, not without leaving something tacky behind. The same as how Connor’s ran off to Anaheim but left a part of him in Toronto. This layer of residue that stuck. 

“You’re allowed to feel things like that,” Freddie tells him. He’s always so careful, it’s laced into his words. The way he says it, like Connor’s a frightened animal. “Wins that big, Cup wins, they’re not easy. They’ve never been easy. This isn’t on you.”

Connor takes a swig and wants the thinking to stop. Wants the thoughts to dim into nothing. About anything and everything. “You can’t tell me that.”

 

 

(Watching the Stanley Cup Finals is a bittersweet way of passing time, especially when neither of the teams are your own. When it’s Connor sitting back on the palms of his hands, watching each shot, each check, each careful play, with cautious attention. 

The Leafs have not yet made it that far.

He’s watching Anaheim get closer, closer, closer, and all he can think about is the goaltender he concussed. The guy who smiled in the interview after he was let back into play and said it was an accident. That they’d settled the situation. 

The guy Connor kissed once, twice, and texted all the way through the Ducks’ playoff run. 

On screen, Freddie lifts the Cup above his head and Connor blinks.)

 

 

If there is an energy between them, something untouched that crackles like wild flames, Connor feels it now more than ever. Now that Freddie’s wearing this worn t-shirt all soft and pastel, tucked away on the couch with his eyes fixated on the TV. 

It’s somewhere near midnight and Freddie’s watching a sitcom with a laugh track and everything, Connor almost wants to laugh just at that, but when Freddie’s gaze creeps over to him, it dies in his throat. 

That’s it. That’s when it starts, when Connor forgets how to form words and all the things he wants to say turn into gibberish. 

“Hey,” he offers, half-embarrassed. 

Freddie reaches for the remote. “Oh, did I wake you? Do you need me to turn it down, or?”

When Connor shakes his head, he relaxes, but the volume on the TV still drops a notch. “I was just going for a glass of water, I didn’t even know you were up.” 

”Oh, um, yeah,” Freddie says, and lifts a shoulder, dropping it. “I was just about to head to bed.” 

For a beat, the silence makes his stomach flip and his heart race and race and race. 

None of them make a move, Connor can barely bring himself to shift closer to the kitchen. Freddie looks like he’s analyzing this, like he’s trying to figure something out. Connor can’t read the look he’s wearing well enough to want to say anything, but the silence is throwing him off. 

He opens his mouth to say, “Good night” but Freddie says, “Anyways,” at the same time, and they sort of draw back from whatever they both were going to say just to pause. 

Connor laughs first, and Freddie huffs out this light little chuckle. His eyes follow the bend of Freddie’s mouth when he does it, which is exactly why Connor ends up leaving the room with a weak smile. He’s a lot more tired than he’s letting off, he thinks, and there’s no way he’s going to blurt something out because of it. Something he’s going to regret the second it leaves his mouth.

He knows the feeling, has lived those moments right after spitting out the wrong thing. When a chill drips down your spine and every inch of your being feels sick. He knows how bad it gets and he can’t do it again. 

Because Freddie doesn’t let them get close. He isn’t speaking to him as much as he used to, as much as they both would, they don’t fall asleep in bed together and Connor can barely remember what his lips feel like. That’s always been a fear—forgetting a sensation like that. 

Connor misses him. A lot of him, every part of him, actually. And voicing that isn’t very much of an option because they aren’t like that. They never have been. 

Connor is not new to this.

 

 

He wakes up feeling good. 

There’s a buzz of a headache in his right temple, and his eyes hurt when he blinks them open to the bright light, but he feels good. It’s embarrassing in this sickening sense, with that voice in the back of his head that’s telling him Freddie’s the only reason he’s here. The only reason Connor hasn’t left yet.

Which. He has no right to stay, even. No right to keep this up, to pull Freddie into his sorrow and all but force him into pity. 

But Connor feels good and for a moment, a whisper of a second, he forgets there’s a Toronto to miss.

Freddie’s up before him, that much is routine. And Connor can tell as much from the squeaky clean atmosphere of the kitchen, the pot of coffee on the counter and the fact that the digital clock over the stove reads just slightly past 12. 

The coffee needs to be reheated and while Connor’s doing that, he wanders over to the table where a couple magazines have piled up by the basket of fruit.

There’s an issue of ESPN, one from Ikea, and on top of all of that in jarring colours, Sports Illustrated is peering up at him with _AN INSIDE LOOK AT THIS YEAR’S HISTORIC STANLEY CUP WIN_. 

Connor blinks and feels his throat go tight. He tries to swallow around it, feeling it click, once, twice. There’s a special discomfort in the way the floor goes unsteady beneath him, then. 

He reaches for the magazine, unsure of just what he’s doing, and before he processes much else it’s in his hands. With smiling faces, a cup, and a team celebrating what they fought tooth and nail to earn. Connor hates it. 

“Hey, you’re finally up,” Freddie says from somewhere behind him. His footsteps steer towards the table. “I was thinking pasta for lunch because, like,” he pauses, and Connor barely registers just the weight of Freddie’s shadow drawn over him, before, “oh, fuck.” 

“I wasn’t snooping around,” Connor tells him, suddenly feeling like a stranger again. Feeling everything go wrong, his mouth going dry, and this house seeming far away and unfamiliar. It isn’t home. It will never be home. 

“I know,” Freddie says, his voice soft. He takes the magazine from Connor’s hands carefully and puts it face down on the table. “This is okay, you’re not snooping. This is your place for now, too. You don’t have to worry about that.”

Connor stares down at the magazine and he doesn’t think about the way Freddie had tried not to touch him as he slipped it out from his fingers. He doesn’t think about the space between them, the zone Connor is forbidden to lean into, and he exhales. Because he doesn’t know what to do. What to say.

“I’m only a guest here,” Connor says. “You shouldn’t—I wasn’t even invited.” 

Freddie looks at him with this little prickle of something in his eyes. Hurt, maybe. Connor hates the thought of that, hates thinking that he could hurt Freddie. 

“I didn’t mind.” 

“Can you just stop,” Connor blurts, before he has much of a handle on getting any other phrase in the english language out. “You need to stop that. What you’re doing.” 

Freddie frowns, despair wrought into the lines of his face. “Connor, I,” he starts, and sort of drops it as he goes. Because Connor doesn’t say anything else and just stares him down, watching. 

There’s a beat of silence between them. Connor feels it carving a deep hole in his chest. Digging and digging.

“Okay,” Freddie says. He straightens up. Connor feels small. “Then, pasta. I’ll do that.” 

He looks at Freddie, looks at him heading back across the kitchen. He doesn’t look at anything else. 

Connor lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.

 

 

(Before leaving, Connor talks to Patrick once. 

He apologizes and tells him that they have a whole new season waiting for them. Tells him next year, one more try, and Patrick gives him this sad little smile.

“It’s your show now, kid,” he says, and ruffles Connor’s hair like he’s getting spoken to by his father. “You get the boys to bring that thing to Toronto.” 

Connor nods sharply. He keeps on a strong face, but swears his lungs stop working.)

 

 

His phone buzzes twice while he’s sitting out on the porch. 

It’s with about a second’s pause between each buzz and Connor’s used to the calls and the texts. He’s used to ignoring every attempt at an extended olive branch or a plead for answers and he doesn’t feel bad. He’s never felt bad. 

But then it’s one more and Connor feels a twinge of unease in his chest until he reaches for the phone. 

Someone sounds the bell of a bike in the back lane and not even that’s enough to tear his focus from the three texts sitting on his lock screen, all from Zach. 

It’s _hey_ and _brownie_ and _it’s been a week man_

Connor frowns at the screen and he thinks there might be something wrong with him if he just clicks his phone off without answering back. Because he wouldn’t feel guilty. He doesn’t think so, at least. He thinks he could give himself at least a few hours to articulate a response to that and even then—the hours could turn to days and he wouldn’t even flinch.

That’s the selfishness in him that’s came out. The part of him that turns a blind eye to everything that he had, all in the hopes that one day it won’t seem superficial and empty and maybe there’ll be a fucking reason for this. For all of this.

He has no right to feel hurt. He knows he shouldn’t and that he’s being dramatic. He knows he still has years and years and years in this league, but nothing is _working_. 

He only gets one life and one chance and. He doesn’t know anymore.

 _i’m sorry_ , he types out. But he erases that. Then he goes with _i miss you_ , but that ends up getting trashed, too.

Connor turns on his read receipts and powers his phone off. 

He doesn’t say a word for the rest of the day. Not to Zach, not to Freddie, and when Freddie tells him good night, there’s a crack of misery down the center of his voice that Connor wishes he never heard. 

 

 

For the first time in what feels like too long, Connor wakes up before sunrise. 

It’s an accident for the most part, because his sleep schedule muddles up every single part of him into waking at the worst times of the day. His body was trained and compacted into a tightly knit schedule with meticulously planned hours. Meal plans and workouts and practice and _that_ was his entire life. His everyday. 

It was another schedule every damn day and it was like pinching himself with a reminder that he’s nothing but a hockey player. A piece of shit hockey player and if he was anything else, nobody would care. If he was anything else, though, he could breathe. He could live. 

Connor’s lived, these past few days. 

So, he gets out of bed, laces up his shoes, and runs until he’s toppled over in a patch of grass, sucking in breaths like he’s been clocked in the throat. 

Sweat sticks to his skin and the air is hot, humid, and doesn’t help with anything other than keeping it plastered down. He feels awful and he hates doing it, but there’s a feeling of freedom in finally letting himself leave the house. Stepping out into a state he’s lived in for the past week but never quite experienced. 

For fuck’s sake, Connor saw an honest-to-god cactus just down the street. He waved at early bird neighbours setting off to work and smiled like he hasn’t in a while. It felt normal. He felt okay. 

Connor chokes on another few breaths before getting up to go inside and swipes at the beads of sweat on his forehead while fishing his key out of his pocket.

Freddie hadn’t given him a key—he would never ask for one. But this was hanging on the rack so he thought it’d be okay to take and if it makes him feel odd, using the key to come in after months, he decides not to mention it. To himself or anyone else. 

Connor catches sight of Freddie eating a bowl of cereal in the kitchen. It’s something bland, wheaty. Connor wants to make a joke about it being cardboard-boring. But he doesn’t. Because he doesn’t think he should let himself grow to be that type of comfortable around Freddie anymore, not now or ever.

So, “good morning,” he says, in lieu of _hi_ or _how’s it going_. Because he’s weird. 

Freddie looks up from his bowl and the phone in his hand. “Oh,” he says, muffled by the cereal in his cheek. He swallows. “You’re up? Already? Honestly wouldn’t believe it if I wasn’t seeing it for myself.” 

Connor nods slowly. “Yeah,” he says. It’s hard to look him in the eyes.

“Oh,” Freddie says again, it’s a completely different tone this time. Crestfallen. “Sorry, no coffee, didn’t think you’d be up this early.

Connor looks at him, then at the empty spot on the counter. He says, “it’s fine. I’m just gonna go shower.” It feels clunky in his mouth, a bad excuse to leave. So he turns to get out before having to face it.

“Um, yeah. Okay,” Freddie’s voice follows him out, and Connor tucks himself into his room before having to face it for even a second more than he needs to.

 

 

(The first time they hook up, Connor stirs in the morning to an empty bed in an empty room. It’s where the walls practically shiver in his presence, all unfamiliar territory and quiet in this eerie way. 

Connor knows where he is, he just isn’t familiar enough to navigate it. Not alone at least. 

Still, he slides on his boxers and a shirt to wander out of bed. He pads through the place barefoot, unfamiliar with the hallways, all the pictures. There’s one of Freddie pressing his helmet to Rakell’s, it makes Connor smile. It makes this feel a little more friendly. A little warmer. 

The entire place is buried beneath this soft silence and Connor breathes easy underneath all of it. Where the light seeps in through blinds and trickles gold across the floors. He follows it like it’s his only guide. 

It works to bring him to the living room, where Freddie’s sitting with a blanket draped overtop his shoulders. He’s wearing a threadbare shirt and his hair is mussed from the pillow and—maybe Connor’s fingers. The thought of it makes his stomach flip. 

There’s a crease on his cheek and he looks, as a 6’4” goalie, like something delicate. Connor feels it in his chest, the way his heart aches and he moves closer in search of something to melt against. 

“You left me alone,” Connor complains, gladly taking the spot beneath the blanket next to Freddie when it’s offered up. “Your sheets are cold without you.” 

Freddie hums and tilts his head against the top of Connor’s, pulling him in closer. “Didn’t think you wanted me there in the morning.” 

Connor sighs, good-natured, but maybe just slightly peeved. When he tilts his chin up, he misses Freddie’s lips enough to pathetically plant a kiss to his jaw. “Do you really think I’d let you fuck me if I didn’t want you there? What kind of guy do you take me for?” 

Freddie’s smile is faint in return, this little thing that just barely brushes his lips. And Connor _wants_. Enough that it hurts. 

“Next time, then. I’ll stay,” he says. 

Connor reaches for his hand and holds on with both of his own. He presses into Freddie’s side, greedy to take in all of his warmth. “Next time,” he says, smiling to himself. Just the sound of it on his tongue is enough to spark excitement in his veins. “I think I’d like that.”)

 

 

Connor hovers in the bathroom for just a moment after showering. 

His mind’s racing and he’s thinking: maybe he’s overstayed his welcome, maybe he shouldn’t be here, maybe it’s for his own good that he leaves before his fucking feelings get caught up in the wrong place at the wrong time.

But he’s also thinking: Freddie, Freddie, Freddie. 

His hands are braced at the edge of the countertop while he just breathes and tries to clear his head, because he doesn’t need any of that bouncing around the inside of his skull. He’s never needed it. Every time he’s caught his mind wandering. Each glance he’s taken. It has all felt unusually heavy, this weight that creeps down to his shoulders and anchors him to the ground. 

It hasn’t been long, that he’s been living in Anaheim, but he looks a lot more well-rested in the mirror. He looks calmer. He looks okay. And Connor thinks he can be—okay. If he’s with Freddie. If he sees him in the mornings and smiles with him and can do this. What they’re doing. Or, what they used to do. 

He stays for longer than he should, until the hair plastered to his forehead is practically dry. 

Freddie’s door down the hall is shut, but the lights are glowing out the gap underneath, so Connor doesn’t linger on it. He doesn’t say a word. Not about most things, actually. 

Instead, he makes plans to go out alone. It’ll be good for him. 

 

 

“Hey,” Connor says, stopping just short of making it to the foyer. Freddie’s thumbing through his phone when he looks up at Connor. There’s a good bit of distance between them, which isn’t a problem, but. 

“Heading out?” Freddie prods, it’s gentle. Not sounding like he’s opposed to it. Rather like this is a casual thing between them, like Connor lives here and pops in and out whenever.

“I was looking at some restaurants and there’s this really _green_ place just off main. Veggies and shit?” He shrugs, because he isn’t even sure what it’s about, but the reviews were promising. And he needs to get out.

“Veggies,” Freddie echoes. “It’s the offseason and you’re worried about vegetables? I mean, I know _hockey_ and everything, but really.” 

“You aren’t allowed to say a word about this, actually. With your fucking—“ he waves a hand at Freddie. “—schedule.”

“Being organized isn’t the same at eating healthy.”

“But it really is.” Connor rolls his eyes, but he knows it’s fond. It feels fond and that’s a big part of the problem. He tries not to let his lips quirk up, because he can’t. He can’t do that. “You should, um. You should come with me.” He offers it on a whim and. 

Freddie swallows. The room feels tense. Smaller than Connor remembers it.

“I mean, if you want to. You can, I wouldn’t mind,” He adds, trying to wring the frantic spikes of nervousness out of his voice. 

“I think I’m good for now,” Freddie says, which is enough to brush away the tense air between them, but Connor still hates the way that makes him feel. It shouldn’t feel like rejection. On Connor’s part, it was just an offer. Friendly and just for the sake of being kind, but that’s a little harder to convince himself of when he’s looking Freddie straight in the eyes. 

He sucks in his bottom lip and nods his head jerkily, up and down. There isn’t a chance that he should still be thinking about the way Freddie had twisted his mouth, how he looked as though Connor was an idiot to even suggest going out together. “Okay, no problem. Cool. I’ll, uh, see you, then.” 

When he leaves, when he’s just out of earshot of Freddie, breathing is just that much easier and he hates how that works.

Because this is the same as it has always been. Connor’s heart races and blood rushes to his head and every part of him is anxious, anxious, anxious. But it’s for all the wrong reasons this time. 

 

 

He misses them. It’s embarrassing. 

Yeah, he figures it out. He figures out what that feeling in his chest is. The one spitting anger and greed, that engulfs the rest of his emotions. The one that turns everything into something rotten and disgusting. Something to look down on.

Connor could smile and feel how tightly woven it is. How it pulls falsely at his lips, tugging them into this facade of joy which is. Fucking awful. It feels—Connor would say it feels agonizing, but it doesn’t feel like much. 

He just wants to take, wants to fill that hole in his chest with something. Because, maybe it’s a symptom of losing in the finals, maybe it’s homesickness, maybe it’s because he hasn’t returned a single call he’s received in the past few days, but there’s a gap that he needs to fill.

Between them, nobody talks about it. But Connor figures it out. Yet, he isn’t allowed to say a word.

Like when he gets home to Freddie’s bedroom door ajar, open like he’s inviting Connor in, and he looks at it once. Twice. Before schooling himself and slipping into the guest bedroom.

They sleep in separate beds like they have been for days, but it’s still new. And Connor lays there sometimes, at night, thinking about how easy it would be to fall asleep with his arms wrapped around someone. Or with a mouth over his. Just something to doze off to, something warm and sweet, something he could fall for if it ever came to it.

But Connor turns to his cold sheets somewhere in Anaheim and thinks this is enough.

 

 

“I’m sorry,” Freddie says, and the screen door slides shut.

Connor doesn’t have to turn around to look, it’s that same rickety sound of the door, the same thump of Freddie’s socked feet against the porch, the same everything, actually. 

He watches a tree in the lawn wave at him and keeps looking, just so he doesn’t have to watch the way Freddie’s eyes go pitiful. The way he’s seen them soften dozens of times before. “You shouldn’t be,” Connor says. He pushes the hair out of his face and wishes he could say anything else. “You don’t _have_ to be.”

Freddie’s hand touches Connor’s shoulder and he’ll say, “but I want to be,” or, “just come inside,” or, “I am.”

But instead, he says, “and you don’t have to be here, but you are.”

Connor looks at him now. Looks at Freddie and his lips, his eyes, the fingers on his shoulder and he breathes as slowly as he can. As if he doesn’t want it to be heard. 

What it is though, is that for the first time in too long, Freddie’s letting himself touch and Connor’s letting himself be touched, and it feels like something he’s wanted for months. Like finally reaching the peak of the mountain or doing something impossible. 

Connor says, “I shouldn’t be,” and he doesn’t touch Freddie back like he wants to. He doesn’t touch his hand or look him in the eyes and he feels embarrassed at the thought of doing it. He feels like he should be ashamed of thinking it, and underneath the weight of it all, he can barely get himself to move. 

“Connor.” 

Freddie doesn’t say anything else, but when he dips closer, Connor cracks. 

He lets himself sink in to press his forehead against the crook of his neck. Where the skin is hot and welcoming, where Connor can pretend he’s home and fall against him like gravity. 

He weaves his arms around Freddie, keeping them glued over the soft fabric of his shirt. Connor breathes in the faintest smell of soap and almost laughs because it’s painfully familiar, it’s just. Nothing about it is funny. 

It’s the exhaustion maybe. The letting go, the finally giving in, the holding Freddie and getting held back like he hasn’t since he’s gotten here. 

It’s feeling the quietest taste of happiness flickering underneath his skin in _Anaheim_ when Toronto felt hopeless to him. 

And it could be funny, but it’s pathetic.

Connor stays like that for longer than he’d ever let himself admit and stays clutching at the thin fabric of Freddie’s shirt, holding on like it’s all he has left. Like letting go of Freddie would be letting go of everything.

He swallows a breath when he pulls back. “Can we please. Can we stop doing this.” 

It’s vague and risky and Freddie’s mouth turns down like it’s bad news, when Connor barely knows how to ask what he’s asking for, but Freddie shifts away. 

Both his hands go into the pockets of his sweats and he almost looks sheepish like that, while Connor’s the one with warm cheeks and a head full of guilt.

“You’re only here because you don’t know how to be anywhere else,” Freddie says, and it feels harsh. “That’s all this is.”

Connor blinks at him and nods, slow. Everything he does is slow. “I know, that’s what I thought. I just.” He doesn’t know what to say or do to make this better, how to explain what he wants. How to tell Freddie he’s _wanted_. 

“That’s what you told me,” Freddie says. “Anaheim means nothing to you and I’m just letting you stay here to collect yourself. You can stay as long as you want, but that’s—that’s it.”

“I know,” Connor repeats. 

He doesn’t close his eyes, but he does look down at the wood of the porch until Freddie leaves, until the air is colder and he can’t feel the weight of a hand on his shoulder anymore. Until he’s alone. 

 

 

(During locker clear out, Connor barely lifts his head to look at anybody. It’s hard to face the guys after, just days ago, they lost something that they’d been chasing after until their legs gave out underneath them. Until they crashed and burned at home, in front of a crowd that fell with them.

Connor hasn’t given enough thought to sounding like anything other than a broken record for his answers to interview questions and people pick up on that pretty quickly. Because sooner or later, it’s Mitch’s turn and the cameras are quick to swivel away from him. 

He told himself he wouldn’t cry on film, but now he can croak out a weak, “thanks, guys,” and bury his head in his hands. He knows it isn’t casual, but he’s going to at least try to keep some of it in. 

There’s a thump next to him, and then a, “hey,” from Zach. 

He can recognize his voice instantaneously, even through how weak it sounds after—crying, maybe. It sounds raw and beaten. 

Connor peaks up at him and Zach’s nose is pinched red.

“I hate this,” Connor says, and it’s the first thing he’s said to a teammate. The first time he’s let the emotion actually flood out through his voice. “It’s weird, like, really, really weird.”

“I know,” Zach says, calm. “I don’t think I’d be able to do this even if we waited until the end of the summer. It’s gonna suck no matter what.”

Clear out is always bitter, always wounded skin and ache, but it’s worse this year. The worst. It’s a completely new battle when you come off an entire postseason that came awfully close. 

Losing has never been an easy pill to swallow, losing in the playoffs, especially. It’s harder to settle after the adrenaline spikes that hit, the highs of each point that gets tallied, the intoxicating feeling of winning and wining and winning until you lose.

It could just be that the higher you climb, the further you fall. 

Connor digs the heels of his hands into his eyes, trying to keep his breaths from sounding cracked open. “Yeah,” he says. It sounds wet. “We really fucked it this time.” 

Zach doesn’t say a word.)

 

 

Connor spends the night replying to texts on his phone. The ones from his mom, dad, Auston, and Travis because _TURN ON UR LOCATION_ was compelling enough to answer to.

He thumbs in and out of his conversation with Zach for a while. Long enough that he feels bad. He drafts a few different texts, all with different approaches to apologizing and one asking him if he should just give it up and go back.

Connor’s scared of sending that one. He can barely get himself to type it out, especially when his fingers tremble with how nervous he is about it. How his stomach turns at the thought of training camp and the preseason and then playing in Toronto after all that. 

He blows out a breath and scrolls through a few more texts, until he gets somewhere midway and finds a number without a contact, one he hates that he immediately recognizes. What, with the Anaheim area code and the preview of _see u then!!_ sent forever ago.

He’d never set a contact for Freddie because—the truth is, he thinks he might’ve been ashamed. They’re both names in the league, not rivals, but instead far apart and loved in the cities they play for. But, somehow, Connor always thought being in contact and fraternizing with someone on the _Ducks_ was territory he should never have been stranded in. Let alone seen sticking hearts in his contact name or caught staring at his phone waiting for a text from Frederik Andersen.

Now, though, Connor thinks he’s got the bravery to type out a _are we ever gonna talk_ , which doesn’t fit in with the other texts. The strings of messages between the two that are too couple-y to be anything else, messages that make Connor feel sick when he looks through them.

He’s aching for the past, yearning for a second chance, but he knows he doesn’t deserve one either. 

He doesn’t hit send and that might be part of the reason why.

 

 

The sun rises, Connor runs, and Freddie makes coffee in the morning like he always does. Connor doesn’t drink it, knows that his eyelids will start drooping and he’ll feel like the energy’s been drained from him, but he doesn’t care. 

Noon comes and they eat lunch together. Freddie’s somewhat quiet and so is Connor, but it’s companionable and so far from what they used to be. Connor’s heart still hammers against his ribs every time their eyes meet, or their fingers brush, and he spends the rest of the afternoon outside or in his room or watching whatever is on TV.

Freddie’s in and out of the house, always lining his shoes up neatly against the wall when he comes in, or locking up before he heads out, always telling Connor that he’ll be back soon. 

If this was three months ago, Connor would tag along. But he doesn’t know if he’s allowed. He doesn’t know if he can even ask, not after what happened before. After he drifted away from Freddie out on the porch, after he’d gotten so close but taken two steps back. 

It’s routine. 

Except, at dinner, Connor says, “I think I need to leave.”

He almost booked a flight two hours earlier. Stared at his phone for at least twenty minutes with the backlight fading in and out, trying to figure out when to leave, which airline to use, how to break the news, how to _leave_. It sank this cold feeling into his bones, which settled heavy and sour, like regret. That’s what knocked his willpower over.

Connor stares down his plate, a half-eaten salad. He can feel Freddie’s gaze on him, piercing and focused. He’s already said more than he should, he knows. 

“Hey,” Freddie says, quiet, careful, and Connor’s tired of being treated like that. Tired of being lead around like he isn’t capable of being his own person, like he’s not a grown fucking adult.

It’s a mean thing to think, but he doesn’t say it. He says, “what happened,” and almost doesn’t continue, because leaving it open like that could answer more than he’s asking. Still, he adds, “to us. Because I miss you and I think you know it, but neither of us talk about it.”

Freddie’s shoulders are tense, the stress clear in the way he holds himself, with careful posture and hands that won’t quit fidgeting with his fork. “I don’t know,” he says, unhelpfully. “How about you tell me?” 

Connor breathes in. “I’m mad,” he blurts, painfully honest. “At the loss, at myself, at everything, I think. It feels like it.”

For the most part, he thinks he’s pouring out a lot. Bordering on too much, more than he’s admit to anyone for what feels like a long time. He hasn’t been able to pull together the irritation in his head enough to actually put it into words, let alone tell Freddie. Freddie, who he’s anxious to be around and can barely look in the eyes if he isn’t buzzed or overly courageous. 

Freddie’s eyes go searching, like he’s trying to find something in Connor’s expression. “Has something changed?” He asks. “You weren’t talking before, not a word ever. About anything. And now you’re trying to confide in me?” 

Connor wants to say more, he’s put enough out into the air that he could say so much more, but Freddie’s still closed off. He’s still blocked away from everything Connor’s saying, like something to bounce things off rather than absorb them. 

So, “no,” Connor says, quietly. Hopelessly. “Nothing’s changed.” And quickly enough to shock, it lands somewhere near the top of the list of things he isn’t proud of saying.

Freddie gets up, empty plate in hand. 

“Alright,” he says, and that will be that.

 

 

(It starts slow: Connor stops trying to wheel when the team goes out, every now and then he’ll catch his thoughts drifting to Anaheim, the texts between them are few and far between, but there’s an occasional _nice game tonight_ , a _good luck_ , things along those lines.

Whatever it is that springs up after they first end up in a bed together shouldn’t make Connor’s chest tighten, or his heart flutter, or set him on edge for when they play Anaheim again. But. 

“Me and Freddie,” Connor ends up spilling, one night after getting just a smidge further than tipsy, pressed thigh-to-thigh with Zach in a club. “We, uh, we got together. A while back.” 

Connor tilts his head up from where he’s leaning against the table to gauge the expression on Zach’s face, which is pretty much unclear underneath his blurred line of sight and the muted lighting. There’s a stripe of bright purple light hitting his cheek, but it’s still not enough. 

“Freddie?” Zach asks, blinking at him like he’s trying to adjust to the shit Connor’s decided to throw at him. 

“Andersen.” When Zach still looks like his head hasn’t caught up, he clarifies, “the Duck.” 

“The one you—“ he looks like he’s about to crack up, but he doesn’t. Connor’s still close enough to see the little twitch of his lips. “Like, the one you took out with a puck.” 

Connor scrubs a hand over his face, pushing his hair back. Everything is hot, humid, and uncomfortably enough. “Yeah, I know. It’s. It wasn’t serious or anything, but you know.” 

“Uh, no, I don’t know.”

Connor huffs and leans his head against Zach’s shoulder, which isn’t particularly comfortable, but it’s easier to close his eyes like that. Easier to ignore the spinning of the club, the way the booze makes him dizzy. 

At least, he thinks it’s the booze.

“Think that might be lights out,” one of the guys that slide into the booth says, and Connor’s barely in his head enough to recognize that he’s the one getting talked about.

“Nah, just taking a nap,” Zach responds, because he’s good people, and pats the side of Connor’s face.

Connor doesn’t think about Freddie for the rest the night, but he‘s sure it’s because he ends up snoring into Zach’s shoulder.

So, it starts slow. Starts in Connor’s mind, with little thoughts of Freddie here and there, a confession to Zach, and a good morning text from Freddie when he’s drowsy and hungover. But it’s good. He likes this.)

 

 

The small slit of yellow light that pours out from Freddie’s door flashes over his feet as he walks by his room and for a moment, Connor thinks distorted memories, thinks distant things, and pauses in the middle of the hall. 

He doesn’t mean to knock, but he finds himself doing it anyways and Freddie opens the door up like he’s letting Connor into his house rather than just his room. His expression is calm and calculated.

“You don’t have to knock,” Freddie tells him, too quiet for an empty house between the two of them, but it fits somehow. 

This isn’t a conversation where Connor wants to yell. Then again, this isn’t a conversation he knows exactly how to have.

“Sorry,” Connor blurts, and hates the way that it’s the only thing he can get out. Freddie’s expression doesn’t change, which is a good sign, but it could be because Connor’s really only admitted to being nervous. “I wanted to say good night, actually. We’ve barely talked today and, uh, it felt weird. Going to bed without talking to you.”

Freddie looks at him carefully, focused, and it makes Connor feel small. Just—not in a way that he hates. 

Freddie says, “oh,” and he asks, “it’s weird?” And Connor doesn’t know how to answer that because he already feels like he’s intruding.

He looks at Freddie then down at his hands where a tiny patch of skin on his thumb is picked raw. His fingers are currently working on trying to tear a strand of fabric off his sweats. 

“It’s just that we don’t—“ 

Connor cuts himself off when Freddie’s hand lands on his, the pressure soft enough to still his fidgeting and his eyes flit right back up. That would do it.

“C’mere, Connor,” Freddie says, his words are warm. It’s inviting. He always has been.

Connor steps into his space easy enough that it could be instinctual. It might be. He knows the way he ends up kissing him is.

Since the very first time they ended up like this somewhere in the Honda Center, Connor’s loved kissing Freddie. He’s loved the slide of his mouth, the careful press of his lips, and how he can feel it down to his toes. He could revel in that all over again and still he ends up left hungry to be touched, like he’s being given something but not enough of it, like he’s living off just one breath of air.

It’s that greedy little part of him, folded away, that doesn’t let him have just this. It’s that part of him that he can feel swirl with selfishness at the craving for more.

He betrays himself to let Freddie pull away. 

It’s all delicate, careful touches and gentle hands, and Connor’s only now realizing the press of fingers on his hip. He feels so overcome by this need to have Freddie close to him that it fucking hurts. He’s trying so hard to keep it in that he nearly turns completely. Nearly backs out like not a single thing has happened between them.

Connor swallows as he shifts away. He says, “good night,” all of it slurred together and can barely look Freddie in the eyes as he walks out. 

He hears a quiet, “yeah,” but that’s as far as that goes.

 

 

The first thing he thinks, early in the morning, is: _no, I didn’t fuck up._

It almost startles him, thoughts like that. It’s new, different. Still, Connor smiles to himself, tucked under soft bed sheets against a room that he’s gotten awfully familiar with, and insists he can go back.

He doesn’t get a second chance with everything, nobody does, but he’s got the chance to try this time and he’s not going to blow that.

 

 

Freddie is wearing this soft grey hoodie when he lets himself into Connor’s room, the Ducks logo plastered to the front. His eyes immediately stick to it, where it’s sharp and bold across his chest.

“We should talk,” Freddie says. The room around them is silent and yet his voice is somehow too quiet. “We should’ve talked a while ago actually.”

Connor flexes his fingers around the book in his hands. The cover is worn and well loved with various pages dog-eared. It was in one of the drawers next to the bed. He did not have to start from the beginning. 

“We were supposed to talk?” He asks.

“Unless this feels normal to you.” Freddie moves closer, sitting at the side of the bed. He’s just out of reach. “Is this how you wanna leave things? Would that help you feel good about yourself?”

Connor drags a hand across the side of his face. He doesn’t know where to start, how to scrape together answers.

Freddie says, “what happened,” and it’s what he’s always resorted to. Asking Connor how he feels, asking him where he wants to begin, checking in like Connor can’t take care of himself. It’s nice.

“Everything was wrong,” Connor blurts. “Always. I thought that avoiding you was the problem so I kissed you, and.” 

Freddie’s eyes are carefully focused. “It wasn’t it.” 

“No.” He takes a breath, feeling it shake. “It was. I missed you and I thought about you all the time and then we _lost_ and suddenly everything was worse. I couldn’t handle it.”

“And you decided acting like an asshole would fix that?” Freddie looks at him, disbelief written all across his face. “You really thought I liked trying to figure out what was wrong like—like this is some kind of game?” 

Connor feels the guilt now. Too late into the night, too sober to talk about this. “I didn’t know how else to deal with it, I didn’t think we still had anything between us.” 

“Jesus,” Freddie sighs, and blinks down at the floor. It’s the only time he looks away. “I’ve let you stay in my house. I haven’t thrown you out onto the street. I haven’t ratted you out to one of your guys and I’m trying my hardest to get you through this.” 

Connor scratches at the side of the book cover with his thumb. 

“I care,” Freddie tells him, almost stern. “Is what I’m trying to say. But you acted like you didn’t.”

“I do.”

“You didn’t _act_ like it. Not once since you showed up, since I let you start sulking around my house and dealt with it.” It feels heavy, coming straight from Freddie.

He isn’t sure how to respond, says, “I know.”

“Was it that hard to say something? Or speak up?” 

Connor feels his mouth twist. “Yes,” he says, sincere, and looks back up at him. It feels like the hardest thing in the world to admit. “I already ruined things between us I didn’t wanna make it worse and—and with hockey.” 

“Can you stop thinking about hockey for three minutes?” Freddie snaps, harsh enough that it comes off like a bucket of cold water over his head. The sting of reality flickers underneath it.

“Freddie...”

“You’re here, you’re okay, it. It’s just hockey. Isn’t that enough?” 

Connor wants to nod, but. “I thought you hated me. _I_ hated me. So I just pushed all of that emotion into losing.” He isn’t sure when to breathe, so he pauses. Waits. Says, “It was all I could focus on and I thought it would pass.” 

Freddie asks, “did it?” But the answer is loud and clear between them. Connor knows it. 

“No,” he says, carried by the softest murmur. 

Freddie looks at him like he’s just heard every little thing Connor’s left unspoken, every sliver of ache and pinch of frustration. Freddie _looks_ at him and it’s just so much

He says, “I don’t hate you.” He says, “Connor, I don’t think I could ever let myself do that.” And when he reaches out to put a hand on Connor’s knee, it’s this gentle reassurance.

It takes every inch of his willpower to keep from choking out a desperate _please_ right then and there. Instead, “I miss you.”

“I know,” Freddie allows, as he shifts just to pull Connor into his arms. 

“I miss you, I miss you so much,” Connor says, a frail mantra into the skin of Freddie’s neck. Over and over, enough that it could become meaningless but somehow each time feels just as important. Like he’s needed to get these words out for years. 

His emotions are burning behind his eyes and heavy in his chest and it hurts, it hurts, but Freddie holds him and when Connor tilts his head up to kiss him it’s—it’s better. 

Freddie’s warm and familiar against him and Connor presses his lips against his skin until he can memorize every curve, every line, every dip he hasn’t let himself touch for weeks.

And he finally realizes this is right.

 

 

The summer warmth pools in through windows propped open and Connor can feel the way it melts into his skin, how it digs deep enough that heat spreads through every inch of his body. It’s just a hint from unbearable, but Connor doesn’t shut the windows, instead savours the sunlight that streams in. The way it makes a room glow. 

Freddie’s not in the kitchen, or the living room, and his keys are missing, so Connor flips through a magazine and sips the coffee still sitting on the counter. He helps himself to a piece of toast while watching the way puffs of clouds roll easily across a light blue sky. 

His mind isn’t dead set on anything, barely focused, but he likes the way he feels light. The way everything feels warm and distant and, more importantly, the way he feels okay. 

That’s what sticks out. He doesn’t think about the finals the same way he did at the beginning of the summer, doesn’t worry about the next season, doesn’t linger on the things he’s done wrong. Instead, he breathes in the moment. 

It’s lovely. It’s his. 

 

 

At most, when Connor feels arms wrap around his waist while he’s waiting for his coffee to brew, he feels the softest prickle of confusion. Which melts, quickly, in the urge to press back into the weight and sync his breaths with the soft puffs in his ear. 

“You’re warm,” Connor says, quietly enough that it feels okay to say. 

“Mhm,” Freddie murmurs, and presses his face into the side of Connor’s neck. 

He feels the beginning of a smile dancing over the corners of his lips and reaches up just to skim his fingers across Freddie’s cheek, because touching him now feels so valuable. Freddie’s like gold to him, and Connor—he’s just won the lottery. 

“You’re kind of sweaty, actually,” Connor adds, feeling a grin crack his lips before he even hears the little huff of laughter Freddie lets out. 

“I’m just hot.”

“No, no, you need a shower.”

Connor’s too focused on the sensation of losing the warmth pressed to him to be unsurprised when Freddie’s calm face appears next to him. He’s leaning against the countertop, looking beyond free, these soft hints of pink strewn all across his face. 

“You wanna come?” He asks, and Connor nearly swallows his tongue.

Maybe his concern for the coffee is obvious because all Freddie tacks on is, “unless you don’t think breakfast can wait.” 

“It’s the most important meal of the day,” Connor laments, but he’s already leaning into Freddie’s space. It’s easy, just like it should be.

Freddie just shakes his head and pulls him in.

 

 

The golden street lamps from outside pour a soft glow through the curtains. It’s a familiar sight, the dull light across Freddie’s face, across the room, across Connor’s fingers when he reaches out to touch. 

He feels like a teenager with his back pressed into the couch, his breaths catching in his throat every now and then, like he’s afraid of someone walking in on them. Like making out in the living room of a completely empty condo isn’t socially acceptable. 

He says, “I like this,” into the space between them, when Freddie’s leaving kisses along his jaw. Little brushes of his lips that flare into soft nips, just how Connor wants it. Because somehow, Freddie’s got every part of him written across the back of his palm. 

“Yeah?” Freddie’s laugh is beautiful and Connor can feel it against his neck. “That’s good, because I like you.” 

And something about that sets butterflies off in his stomach, like he isn’t already breathing underneath Freddie. Like his lips aren’t practically numb. Like this is new for him. 

He smiles. 

 

 

“I need to go home,” Connor says. And the room is dark, but the air is warm, and Freddie’s nothing but the shoulder under his cheek against it all. “Not. Not right this instant, or even tomorrow, but I think I need to go home. To my parents, to see some of the guys. I can’t isolate myself from them all summer.”

“You’re right,” Freddie says, and it slips into the dark like it hasn’t been spoken at all. “I’m gonna miss you, you know that?”

Connor blinks. His face feels hot. “It’s gonna suck.”

“But it’ll be good for you.”

“I know.” He lazily moves his index finger in patterns across Freddie’s chest, feeling the faint drag of cotton against his skin. “I’m still gonna text. Or call.”

“That much commitment?” Freddie jokes, and Connor lightly swats at him. “Maybe we can try FaceTime if you can figure out how to use it.”

“Oh, _ha-ha_. I’m pretty sure I can handle it.” He pauses, turning the idea over in his head. The idea of this being real, of them really having something like this. It sounds good, like something he wants to keep, and he decides to try. No matter how hard it gets.

He says, “Can we just. Can we try this? For real, I mean. I don’t want this to be on and off anymore. I don’t wanna lose us.”

Freddie’s fingers ghost over the back of Connor’s hand before fitting themselves against it. It feels like a promise in itself. “We’re not going to. You know why? I’m always gonna be here for you,” he returns. “No matter what we go through, I’m here.” 

Connor wants to say everything that comes to mind, every word that gets jumbled up in the stream of thoughts between his heart and his brain. He wants to spill his emotions onto a platter, but he doesn’t say a thing. He holds onto them, tight, and doesn’t let go.

All that comes out is, “thank you,” but, really, it’s enough. 

 

 

It’s on a Monday morning. 

A Monday morning when Connor’s got a packed up suitcase lined against the wall. When he wakes up tangled in Freddie’s sheets with this compressed homesickness stuck to his stomach. 

It’s a homesickness for a home that isn’t his, but one that could be. Someday, maybe. 

He watches Freddie load his bag into the back of his truck, watches him shut the trunk, and watches him open the door for him. The entire time, Connor’s thinking he has no idea how to leave this. 

He’s been around Freddie for so long that he never thought about the day he’d need to leave. But that’s his _career_ in Toronto. It’s his friends and family and he has so much that he’s turned his head away from. It’s just all coming back now, like it refused to before. 

The beat on the radio is full of serene tones, gentle ups and downs, everything suitable for a morning that should be quiet. Connor can let himself fade into it, watching the blur of a town he barely knows pass by him. 

He thinks about late nights and coffee and brutal flights. He thinks about the summer and the sunshine and golden skin that feels like silk. He thinks about Freddie and doesn’t stop thinking about him until. 

“What’s on your mind?” Freddie asks, just as pleasant as ever. 

Connor already misses him. 

“Thinking about you,” he says honestly.

“I’m not gonna die, you’re just going home, yeah? It’ll be easy, just like before. But better.” Freddie reaches out with just a hand, settling it on Connor’s. 

Connor presses his lips into a flat line. “It’s always hard,” he tells him, “but. It’s different this time. Feels different.” 

Freddie’s eyes catch his, and Connor sees the briefest flash of a smile.

“You’re gonna text me when you land?“ 

Connor nods. “Of course, I’ll make sure to let you know the plane made it in one piece.”

“I mean.” Freddie shrugs. “That would probably be the best case scenario.” 

There’s this glint of joy in his chest when he laughs. Something he can connect directly to Freddie, whenever he’s caught up in an off day. When he needs it most. That corner of him just for Freddie.

 

 

When Connor kisses him, he’s not careful. He doesn’t have to be. He can draw it out. If he wants to, his hand can trail up to the side of Freddie’s neck. He can wrap himself up in it all. The buzz of his lips and the tingle in the tips of his fingers.

He can think, in the back of his head, that he’s falling, and pull away just to look into the warmest pair of eyes he’s ever seen. 

If it isn’t love, it’s a near thing.

“Catch your flight,” Freddie says.

 

 

Training camp starts and ends, the preseason is just as tiring as it always is, and by the time it’s October, he’s finally getting used to it. All over again.

Connor’s only just getting home when it starts getting dark out. It’s been a while since he took his skates off, since he poured his heart into his last shift. But every single inch of his body is still fizzing with the excitement of winning. 

His ears are ringing from the pleased roar of a home crowd and his legs _ache_ , but it feels just how it should. How its always felt to bleed white and blue for the team he loves. 

When he gets inside his apartment, his phone buzzes. 

_nice goal:)_ is all it is, lying across his lock screen. He sets the contact name as _Freddie💓💘_

Connor sends back a few hearts, then _call me tnite?_ and everything falls back into place.


End file.
